THE REVELATOR • April5x, 2021
Atlantic salmon once numbered in the hundreds of thousands in the United States and ranged up and down most of New England’s coastal rivers and ocean waters. But dams, pollution and overfishing have extirpated them from all the region’s rivers except in Maine. Today only around 1,000 wild salmon return each year from their swim to Greenland. Fewer will find adequate spawning habitat in their natal rivers to reproduce. That’s left Atlantic salmon in the U.S. critically endangered. Experts say recovering healthy, wild populations will require eliminating some of the obstacles (literally) in their way. Conservation organizations, fishing groups and even some state scientists are now calling for the removal of up to four dams along a 30-mile stretch of the Kennebec River, where about a third of Maine’s best salmon habitat remains. The process to determine whether any — or all — of the four Kennebec dams that stretch from Waterville and Skowhegan are removed will take years, a diverse coalition, financial resources and agreements to meet the concerns of communities and the dam owner.